The trial of Bill Cosby, as I'm sure you know by now, ended with a hung jury. I'm not sure we know if it was one vote for acquittal or eleven or somewhere in-between…but the prosecutors are saying they're going to try, try again. One suspects there will be a little attempt at a plea bargain, especially if it comes out the jury was 11-1 or 10-2 either way. The side that got the 1 or 2 might not be so lucky next time and willing to deal but maybe that's not in the cards.
A lot of folks online today are outraged that "the system" didn't work…but this is the way the system is supposed to work — sometimes. Juries deadlock from time to time because "reasonable doubt" is subject to so many interpretations. We understand they're not always unanimous just as they're not always right so we have an appeals process. If 12-0 verdicts can be reversed — and they are — then it's not shocking that we have 11-1 verdicts where the 1 is wrong, and I'm sure there are 11-1 juries where the 1 is right.
Also, I see a lot of folks online who are sure Cosby is guilty (or not) because they knew or heard of someone who said they once had an encounter with him and something happened…or didn't. I know a woman who is very, very attractive and back in 1980 or so, not long after she'd been naked in Playboy, spent an afternoon alone with Mr. Cosby. She said she was aware of his reputation but nothing sordid occurred and he was a perfect gentleman. That doesn't prove the other reported sex crimes did or did not occur. I mean, the Boston Strangler didn't strangleevery woman he could have strangled.
I happen to think Mr. Cosby is — as Doonesbury once said — "Guilty, guilty, guilty" but I was and am ready to hear a good case made that he is not. I haven't yet and it doesn't sound like one was presented in the courtroom in this case; just maybe enough to get one or two jurors to think there was something illogical about Andrea Constand's story about being drugged and raped, then seeking repeated contact with Cosby.
Even if Cosby is not retried and this is the outcome, he's still lost big: Lost his reputation, lost his career, lost millions in legal fees. That's not a proper punishment for what he probably did but it's not nothing.